Vettel takes fourth win in a row in hectic race

Sebastian Vettel kept up his winning streak with his fourth victory in a row in Malaysia.

But Red Bull’s rivals were able to push them closer during the race and Jenson Button finished only three seconds behind.

Vettel held his lead at the start but had to defend carefully from Lewis Hamilton. That allowed Nick Heidfeld – who made an excellent start from sixth – to grab second ahead of the two McLarens.

The other Renault of Vitaly Petrov also made a good start but he couldn’t resist pressure from Felipe Massa. The Ferrari driver used DRS to pass at turn one, and Petrov went off shortly afterwards gifting sixth to Fernando Alonso.

Bad start for Webber

Mark Webber’s Kinetic Energy Recovery System failed to work at the start and he dropped like a stone, ending up in a dogfight with Kamui Kobayashi for tenth place.

After several passes and re-passes Webber instead tried to gain a strategic advantage with an early pit stop on lap ten.

The runners in front of him quickly reacted over the following laps, and Renault were unable to maintain Heidfeld’s advantage over the McLarens.

Massa suffered a slow pit stop and dropped further down the order. But Alonso left his pit stop later and came out on Button’s tail, passing the McLaren at the first corner.

The leading drivers stuck with the soft tyres for the first round of pit stops but Hamilton switched to hards for his third stint. His pace dropped off during the stint and McLaren brought him in for his third stop on lap 37 – with 19 still to go.

Alonso and Hamilton collide

His race began to unravel as a slow stop dropped him behind Button. He struggled to make his second set last – team mate Button was much quicker after his last stop – and Alonso quickly caught him for third.

While Hamilton struggled for pace Alonso’s adjustable rear wing had failed meaning he did not have the advantage of DRS Nonetheless he mounted an attack on the McLaren and was shaping up for a move down the inside of turn four when he clipped Hamilton’s right-rear tyre.

The impact smashed Alonso’s front wing and sent him into the pits for a fourth stop. Hamilton’s car appeared undamaged but he was still struggling with his tyres.

Heidfeld breezed past him using DRS on lap 51. Hamilton had an off afterwards and, despite having only four laps left, pitted a fourth and final time for more hard tyres.

Button tried to give chase of Vettel, but even though the Red Bull driver’s KERS was only working intermittently, he was easily able to maintain a gap over the McLaren.

Webber had also made a fourth stop and with fresher tyres was able to pass Massa for fourth place. The recovering Alonso took seventh.

Petrov crashes out

Hamilton came out of the pits behind Petrov but the Russian driver’s race came to an end in a bizarre incident. He ran wide off the track, bounced high into the air, and landed so hard it broke the mounting on his steering column. He came to a stop while trying in vain to re-attach the wheel.

In eighth place was the only driver to make two stops – Kamui Kobayashi in the Sauber. His team mate Sergio Perez retires after hitting debris which fell off another car.

Michael Schumacher and Paul di Resta rounded off the points-scorers, the latter beating his team mate home by ten seconds.

There was little sign of the widely-anticipated rain, aside from a brief shower around the first pit stops. The race was action-packed without it, but in the end the world champion prevailed once again.

I think they’ll be paying closer attention to the outside of that run-off area. Petrov ran out of run-off and was launched into the air. The drain he hit was right up alongside the circuit. With his hands full of understeer and travelling at speed, he never would have seen it coming. I’ve seen the on-board and I could barely see the drain, so he never stood a chance.

I can’t believe the suspension stayed intact! Timo Glock has a similar accident in Melbourne in 2008 (although I think Petrov outdid him today) and his wheels all bounced off. If the steering wheel hadn’t have come free, he might have been able to continue! :P

Vettel’s 6th fastest lapt of the race suggests he had pace in hand. He was also able to put in some fast laps in his 3rd stint when he needed to, again confirming pace in reserve. China, however, will be a diiferent story as it is less areo critical and more of a power circuit. If Red Bull can not make their KERS reliable, they will certainly struggle!

That’s correct. I spotted the Lotus right behind one of the Toro Rossos as they all came across the line at the end of the race. Good show from Kovalainen, showing that Lotus are there or there abouts in terms of tagging onto the midfield.

Yawn! Tell me that win wasn’t predictable.
Even Webber without KERS or DRS was putting in sensational lap times.
The only consolation is that Redbull allow Webber to fight with the other teams while leaving Vettel free to discuss Dante’s Inferno with his race engineer. :-)

On-board cameras showed renault drivers pressing KERS much later( > 3rd gear ). The ferrari, on the other hand, much earlier( cud not make out gear though ), an explanation of why they lost ground. Anybody notice wheel-spin on ferrari or what gear alonso was in when he used KERS off start ?

What a great race! terrific start from the Genii warriors, the new stars in the wars… (Shame about Petrov), Alonso and Hamilton continue to battle between themselves and lose the advantage as a result. Super job by Webber and sterling performance from di Resta and a usual steady result from Jenson.
Good result also from Massa, and Rosberg.

Personally i couldn’t enjoy the race because of the DRS stupidity. The whole thing was hax super power in today’s race. No one had to work getting around the other guy except if he had something like KERS or DRS not working.

You can’t have been watching the same race I was because the vast majority of overtake I saw with the DRS only resulted in two cars alongside each other at turn 1, making for some pretty good manoeuvres through T1 and T2.

Just because you have an opinion doesn’t mean you should lie to promote it.

I made this point before but you can’t make these tyres last significantly beyond the car set-up without dropping a lot of pace. What McLaren were thinking is beyond me, though Button made the last stint work, could have been down to his differing set-up.

It was also, I have to say, a poor choice of starting line for Hamilton. He was never going to get down the inside and lost 2nd because of it. It may have made the race pan out differently and more positively for him.

” I have to say, a poor choice of starting line for Hamilton. He was never going to get down the inside and lost 2nd because of it”. I think Hamilton was caught out by Vettel weaving down the straight. He clearly moved right to cover, then drifted left to cover again, then back right again to close out Hamilton.

Hamilton was blocked twice by Vettel and I have to commend his decision not to try and suddenly take a wider line in a braking zone as it is so easy to collect otherfast starting drivers arriving unseen.

The nature of these tyres indicate that those with aggresive driving styles like Hamilton are suffering, so although i’m no tyre expert, how the hell did kung fu Koby get to the end on 2 stops with all those battles he was fighting. Maybe Sauber have unlocked some suspension tweek?

As Button said sometimes trying to look after them makes things worse because you don’t heat the up right causing them to get destroyed. Considering Lewis had the mechanics going on and on in his ears about looking after the tyres(what annoying racing when you can’t race) he maybe went completely the other way and looked after them a little too much.

I really hope someone starts picking up pace and catch up with RBR. I don’t mind Webber and I really admire what they and Newey have managed to achieve so far and no doubt will achieve in the future with their technical nous and the way they’ve organised the team.

But I have to admit I’m not particularly fond of Vettel, I’m losing respect for Horner almost every time he opens his mouth these days and I don’t like the way Helmet Marko hovers in the background. In short, RBR is definitely one of my least favourite teams and they’re bloody winning all the time! Stop it already! :p

I’d like Sauber to drop the lower-midfield team mentality and realise they have a shot at competing without risking their results on tyre preservations pitstop strategies. I’d like Ferrari to find about half a second to 7 tenths compared to RBR and McLaren. I’d like Petrov and Heidfeld to come in together, as opposed to have one of them way down somewhere. And I’d like Williams to make their car a second a lap faster. Come on guys, get it together already :D

Good race, slightly better than Melbourne in my opinion, great to see another Renault podium. I honestly think they are 4th best at the moment and closer to Ferrari than Mercedes are to themselves.

I notice there’s been a few negative responses to the DRS on the site this time round. But personally I think we should still hold out and see. We’ve had Melbourne – one of the least DRS effective tracks and then Malaysia – one of the most effective.

Fascinating race after a very long time we have seen such a action packed dry race on a Tilke track, I do wonder whether we have had ever seen any?

Great start by the Renault driver,many have underestimated Heidfeld but he proved that he is a good racer today.Petrov mistake was his own making as he should have had backed off & joined the track instead to trying to go full throttle. Penalties weren’t justified.

Bad race for Schumacher, he lost to Kobayashi who did had a good race.

One thing is that we have seen many overtaking today but many of those been failed to pick up live by the TV coverage people, it was disappointing they need to work on that. So lets go to China for another great race.

Did anyone notice how ridiculous the “top” McLaren made Jenson wear was. They might have been getting away with that in the press conference when they had a desk, but without that desk you can clearly see its a top made specifically for the press conference, not helped by it being blindingly white.

Yeah. Not a surprise for me to see a RedBull winning again though it was a good race. And I suspect Vettel’s series won’t end soon. Good to see again a Renault ahead of a Ferrari. It’s pretty obvious how this season will evolve. RedBull and McLaren are untouchable, then Ferrari and Renault will have their fight, and then Sauber, Mercedes, and then the rest of the teams.

Heard rumours that Red Bull won’t be running Kers in China and with china having the longest straight i believe there could be an upset. I also can’t see Ferrari being so far behind for too much longer.

I really hope that Finger Wagger doesn’t take the championship this year